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Early Parental Loss A Risk Factor For Adult Psychiatric Illness

Children who lose a parent early in life, either by death appear more likely than others to develop schizophrenia, depression or bipolar disorder as adults.

The child’s adjustment after the death of a parent.

In a study conducted with school children bereaved and non-bereaved children were compared. Shortly after the death of a parent very little difference was found in measures of emotional well-being. However, after two years the bereaved children showed higher levels of social withdrawal, social problems and anxiety as well as lower levels of self-esteem. In approximately 20% of the bereaved children these levels were such as to indicate that the children would benefit from professional assistance.

Source: Worden, J.W. & Silverman, P.R. Parental death and the adjustment of school-age children. Omega: Journal of Death and Dying, 1996, 33 (2): 91-102.63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes (Source: U.S. D.H.H.S., Bureau of the Census”

• 90% of all homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes
• 85% of all children that exhibit behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes (Source: Center for Disease Control)
• 80% of rapists motivated with displaced anger come from fatherless homes (Source: Criminal Justice & Behavior, Vol 14, p. 403-26, 1978.)
• 71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes (Source: National Principals Association Report on the State of High Schools.)
• 75% of all adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers come from fatherless homes (Source: Rainbows for all God’s Children.)
• 70% of juveniles in state-operated institutions come from fatherless homes (Source: U.S. Dept. of Justice, Special Report, Sept 1988)
• 85% of all youths sitting in prisons grew up in a fatherless home (Source: Fulton Co. Georgia jail populations, Texas Dept. of Corrections 1992)

  (Because only a portion of each age group grew up in a fatherless home,) these statistics translate to mean that children from fatherless homes are:

   

  • 5 times more likely to commit suicide
  • 32 times more likely to run away
  • 20 times more likely to have behavioral disorders
  • 14 times more likely to commit rape
  • 9 times more likely to drop out of high school
  • 10 times more likely to abuse chemical substances
  • 9 times more likely to end up in a state-operated institution
  • 20 times more likely to end up in prison. The finding comes from a large Israeli case-control study involving nearly 80 patients each with major depression, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia and an equal number of healthy controls.

  Study director, Dr. B. Lerer of Hadassah-Hebrew University Medical Center in Jerusalem, Israel, and a multicenter team found that the rates of parental loss during childhood were significantly higher among patients with psychiatric disorders in this population than in controls.

  Specifically, loss of a parent during childhood significantly increased the risk of major depression in adulthood by 3.8-fold, according to a report in the Feb. 13th issue of Molecular Psychiatry. Parental loss during childhood was 2.6 times more likely in participants with bipolar disorder and 3.8 times more likely in those with schizophrenia compared with controls.

  The effect of parental loss on the development of psychiatric disorders was more striking if the loss was due to permanent separation rather than death, and if the loss occurred before the age of 9 years.

  Early parental loss also significantly increased the risks of smoking, physical illness, divorce lower income and living alone in later life.